“Have they been found yet?” Levi Lipman asked.

Rabbi Glazer walked slowly to the desk at the front of the classroom as the class clamoured for news. Unanimously, they had voted to return from the overnight early and come into school the next day as usual. No one was in the mood of camping out and having fun when two of their friends were missing.

Rabbi Glazer himself — after accompanying the boys back home — had returned to the forest and re-joined the search party, together with Mr. Kreiser. But when morning came, he’d headed back to be at school for the eighth graders, many of whom looked like they hadn’t slept all night, either.

“There’s no news — yet,” he said gently. “But don’t worry, boys. The forest where Avi and Elchanan were dropped off is a huge place, so it’s taking a long time, but the search parties will be covering every inch of it. Im yirtzeh Hashem, they’ll be found very soon.”

Despite his reassurance, the boys looked distressed.

“I can’t concentrate on anything,” Hillel Shapiro, a friend of Elchanan, said glumly.

“Me neither,” said Yitz Elberg. He was thinking of Avi, and the good times they always had together.

“I was saying Tehillim the whole night,” Pinny Schwartz added.

Rebbi walked around to the front of his desk and looked at the exhausted boys in front of him.

“Boys,” he said, voice gentle, “let’s do something as a class. For Avi and Elchanan. As a zechus that they should be found very soon.”

“We could split up Sefer Tehillim,” Meir Rottman suggested.

“Have more kavanah in davening,” Shmuli Deutsch called out.

“Or we can each commit to learning extra every night,” Hillel put in.

Rabbi Glazer shook his head. “Those are all beautiful ideas, boys, but I’m thinking of something else. Something special, as a class. Something that’s very hard for us. Something… that I’m sure will make Avi and Elchanan very happy when they return to us.”

The room fell quiet as the class digested his words.

“Shalom,” Rebbi whispered. “Peace, between all of you, all of us as a class. Each of you, right now, choose to make a commitment that you’ll end the feuds, the conflict, the fighting between different groups.” He spread his arms out wide. “Because you see, at the end of the day, we’re all one. We care about each other. If we commit to hold on to this feeling of closeness, of caring, on a regular day — what bigger zechus could that be for Elchanan and Avi?”

The classroom was very still. Rebbi looked around, as every boy slowly nodded.

“So that’s it? No more fighting?” Tuvy Frank asked, and the tension broke as everyone laughed.

Rabbi Glazer looked at the clock. It was 10:14 a.m.

“Boys, I haven’t heard updates in nearly an hour,” he said. “I’m going to call Mr. Kreiser.”

“How many hours have we been walking?” Avi asked Elchanan. He had a watch, but the mere act of lifting his hand and pushing back his sleeve to check it seemed too burdensome as they trudged through the forest, one step after another after another —

“Not very many,” Elchanan tossed back. “It’s only, what, 10:14 in the morning? We came down from the tree maybe an hour ago.”

Only an hour? Avi’s legs felt like they’d been walking for many, many days.

“Just think — this time yesterday we were still at school,” he said.

“I wonder what they’re doing now,” Elchanan mused.

“Well, not fighting.” Avi felt a pang. “They’re probably worried sick about us.”

He thought about his classmates, and his heart lurched. What he wouldn’t give to be back there — with all of them, his friends, Elchanan’s, and yes, Elchanan himself, even if he’d hog the basketball court every single day.

And his parents — with all Ma’s overprotectiveness and Ta’s checking up on him in school — if only he could see Ta again, right now—

“Avi!” Elchanan said suddenly, coming to a halt a few steps ahead. “Come — look!”

“The search party?” Avi said, scrambling to catch up, his heart quickening.

“Not the search party,” Elchanan said, voice betraying a carefully controlled excitement. “But — I see a road. We’re coming to the edge of the forest.”

to be continued…

(Originally featured in Mishpacha Jr., Issue 886)